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Written in fRoots issue 234, 2002


L’HAM DE FOC
Cançó De Dona I Home
Sonifolk 20169

The first track of this, particularly its squealing bagpipe, gutty lauto and creaking tromba marina opening, is almost Hedningarna-like, and though the scale and form swiftly become more clearly Mediterranean it’s a reminder of the dronal, non-chordal nature of both Arabic and much Nordic music.
      València band L’Ham De Foc plays songs written almost entirely by fine, strong singer Mara Aranda and multi-instrumentalist Efrén López, with roots on all shores of the Mediterranean and sometimes a border or two inland. López uses an arsenal including just about every south European and Middle Eastern plucked, hit or wheel-bowed stringed instrument, to which are added wind instruments including Eduard Navarro’s Galician, Bulgarian and other bagpipes and double-reeds, and a big bunch of bendirs, darabukkas and other hand-percussion. No synths, no samples, no bass, but it’s a meaty sound with all the spirit and guts and getting to grips with the power of the instruments that seems to be so often lacking when players on the hushed early-music scene tickle closely related tools of the trade.
      Despite the alluring textures and contrasts the instruments provide, there’s no widdling around – everything leads to structured, memorable melodies, and matching them very naturally are Aranda’s lyrics, in Catalan, their vivid, economic turns of phrase rooted in the song-poetry of the Mediterranean margins. There are a couple of traditional items – a Bulgarian kopenitsa and a “very very free version” of a Sephardic-Yugoslav song of adultery - but it would be easy to assume that the rest is traditional too, it’s so shapely, pointed and complete.
      During 2002 the band has been performing, as an eight-piece, around Spain promoting this second album, but judging by the European airplay it’s been getting it shouldn’t be long before they’re seen more widely.


© 2002 Andrew Cronshaw
 

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